It was scrawled over with geometrical diagrams and calculations of some sort.
It was patent that this terrible man was no ignorant clod, such as one would inevitably suppose him to be from his exhibitions of brutality.

At once he became an enigma.

One side or the other of his nature was perfectly comprehensible; but both sides together were bewildering.

I had already remarked that his language was excellent, marred with an occasional slight inaccuracy.

Of course, in common speech with the sailors and hunters, it sometimes fairly bristled with errors, which was due to the vernacular itself; but in the few words he had held with me it had been clear and correct.
This glimpse I had caught of his other side must have emboldened me, for I resolved to speak to him about the money I had lost.
"I have been robbed," I said to him, a little later, when I found him pacing up and down the poop alone.
"Sir," he corrected, not harshly, but sternly.
"I have been robbed, sir," I amended.
"How did it happen ?" he asked.
Then I told him the whole circumstance, how my clothes had been left to dry in the galley, and how, later, I was nearly beaten by the cook when I mentioned the matter.
He smiled at my recital.